My apt. is full of mice: Mickey, Minnie, Jerry, etc.
They’re all there!
I feel like I should ask them if they mind sharing the place with me.
What do I do?
Start a chapter of the Mousketeers club?
Call Pinky and the Brain?
Contact Disney about a new animated feature?
Invite Donald Duck and make it a threesome?
On a practical note, I did use some of those “sticky boards” that they sell. You get to watch (and listen to) the mice slowly dying until you work up the nerve to toss 'em in a bag.
Where can I buy mousetraps or bait?
Thanks in advance for your help, folks!
Johnnie
My dog has already killed one rat. My cat, being very young, has only killed cockroaches so far. Would you like to borrow them?
I have delivered the coup de grace to a couple of rats by hurling them off the roof. A popular way of putting “stuck” rodents out of their misery is to put them in the middle of the road. Before long a gravel truck will come along…
Obviously, they only live where there is food. In my case rats live in the vicinity because the adjacent restaurant puts out bags of food in the alley nightly for the rats to dine on. Now they are putting out rat poison too, which seems a little cruel to me – invite them over for dinner regularly and then start poisoning them. Another neighbor used to leave bags of garbage in our stairwell but quit doing so after we left a note for them to stop, and as a result we longer see rats in the stairwell. So, the first step is to make sure you are not feeding them anything including dog or cat food.
Like you, I couldn’t find traps in the stores but only the sticky paper. Traps seem more humane to me – break their fuckin’ necks and get it over with. If you ever do find traps, peanut butter is the best bait – smelly and sticks to the trigger.
Hi all!
Thanks for all your thoughts.
I am now seriously considering borrowing Juba’s pets and/or getting my own cat.
It’s either that or start Jolly Johnnie’s Giant Mouse Parade…
Never had a mouse problem - can’t even remember seeing one. Did have a rat problem once, after returning from the UK we were all watching TV one night and I saw one out of the corner of my eye running out through the kitchen!. A taiwanese friend bought a sticky board and it was caught overnight. End of problem - or so we thought. A couple of nights later my wife was ironing and she stepped back - barefoot - onto a newborn!. I searched everywhere for the rats nest and finally found it - with 4 dead occupants deep in the middle of some bedding at the top of the wardrobe. My wife threw it all out - wouldn’t hear of it going to the cleaners.
The sticky boards are the best way to catch mice or rats. However, some pointers might be useful.
After buying several sets of sticky mousetrap-boards, you need to get some small nails, pliers, a hammer, a screwdriver, a large flat wooden board, a large bucket, and plastic trash bags.
For the large flat wooden board, a long rectanguar one works best in my opinion. It shouldn’t be too thick. You can probably find one discarded in an alley somewhere.
Procedure: Use the nails to nail the sticky mousetrap-boards onto the large flat wooden board. You should try to have six to eight inches of space between the mousetrap-boards, to avoid any mouse/rat ending up stuck to two mousetrap boards at the same time. (You need to nail these down onto this large wooden board so that the larger rats cannot “drag” the entire mousetrap board away into some inconvenient location.) Don’t hammer the nails in all the way. Leave about 1/3 of the nail(s) protruding. Three nails per mousetrap-board should be more than adequate. Place your large wooden board next to the wall somewhere where you have seen the little critters running around.
The next morning you will have caught some mice/rats. Fill the bucket with water. Pull out the nails with the pliers. If the mouse/rat tries to bite you, push it away with the steel end of the screwdriver or rap it on the head with the handle of the screwdriver. Put the mousetrap board in the water and push it under. After a few minutes the mouse/rat will stop struggling. Put it in the trash bag, mousetrap-board and all.
Proceed on to the next mousetrap-board, using your pliers and screwdriver to deal with the occupant in the same way. Drown him in the water.
Buy new mousetrap-boards and nail them onto your large wooden board for the next night.
After a few days, you may want to get a new wooden board, since the mice/rats have a way of leaving a “danger scent” on the premises when they feel the end is near.
Note: the above method is not suitable for families with indoor pets such as cats or dogs.
True. To get glueboard glue off your pet/child/self/furniture, rub in some vegetable oil, e.g. salad oil. This will blend with the glue. You can then wash the oil/glue mixture off with soap, shampoo or detergent.
I also advise using glueboards outside, as they tend to trap innocent gekkos.
get yourself a bowl of water and lean a ruler next to it, now apply some peanut butter to the end of the ruler… lil mouse climbs up ruler to get brown peanut butter and goes swimming… like a tetter tawter
I’ll try my best! Set me up for another and I’ll oblige! 
Arent there some herpetologists around that would love some free food?